Cane cutters in the Dominican Republic. Photo by author. All rights reserved.
"We are like slaves in freedom, we work and we do not earn any money, we work for nothing ... we cannot even buy shoes, a shirt, a pair of pants ... we are like slaves in freedom because we are free to leave the job, we know that there are other places to go and work. We can leave, so we are free. But when one does this job he is like a slave, a prisoner, because without money he can't go wherever he wants. He has to stay and pay debts at the shop ... and then the job has to be finished."
With these words, Junior, a 22-year-old Haitian labourer, described to me his condition and that of many of his fellow migrants. They had left Haiti – the poorest country in the Americas – in search of better life opportunities, and now find themselves working under conditions of severe exploitation in the sugarcane fields of the Dominican Republic.
